Any discussion of the background art throughout the specification should in no way be considered as an admission that such art is widely known or forms part of common general knowledge in the field.
Antenna transmitting and receiving systems can take many forms. One form of system is illustrated in FIG. 1 and is known as a parabolic dish type antenna. The antenna 1 includes a parabolic dish 2 which acts to concentrate or focus signals at a focal point 3 where the transmitter/receiver 3 is located.
Many different types of transmitter/receiver are known. For example, Patent Cooperation Treaty Patent Application: PCT/AU2011/000862 entitled “Reconfigurable Self Complementary Array” discloses one form of “checkerboard array” of transmitter/receivers of a self complementary form suitable for use in many applications. Such a checkerboard array is suitable for many uses including in a large receiver network of transmitter/receivers such as that proposed in the Square Kilometer Array (SKA) project.
The checkerboard array design is illustrated schematically 10 in FIG. 2. The design uses a planar array of electrically conducting squares e.g. 11 forming a tiled-like pattern where the squares are equal in size and orientation and of approximately the same area as the inter-square region. The array design includes electrical circuits (not shown) that connect neighboring squares between pairs of nearest corners.
As illustrated in FIG. 3, the electrical circuits include feed conductors 30 that connect the corners of the squares e.g. 11 to electrical circuits located some distance away toward a groundplane 31 that is parallel to the plane of the squares 11. The conductors of the circuits may pass through holes 32 in the groundplane 31, and may include connections to the groundplane and may include one or more terminals to which other circuits may be connected. The circuits may include amplifiers that amplify signals to be received or transmitted to the array.
A circuit configuration that has been found to be effective is illustrated 40 in FIG. 4, with the square patch being interconnected to an amplifier 42 for output of differential voltages e.g. 43. FIG. 5 illustrates the same arrangement as FIG. 4, with the addition of an outside Balun 51 to provide a differential voltage output.
It is desirable to provide an improved form of tiled array design.